For everyone who followed me & T3S back in 2017 (and is, for some reason, still around), here's my long-overdue update on the status of T3S!
Some background: I wrote a moderately popular Max/Preston camp camp fic several years ago called "The Sparrow Still Sings." T3S followed a 24-year-old Max as he returns to Camp Campbell to be a counselor.
About a year after I finished the fic, I decided that it was a good enough story to potentially publish. I wanted to go the traditional route--which meant querying agents and hoping to find a print publisher. This also meant that the story could no longer exist on AO3. For that reason, I deleted it. It was a difficult decision to make--especially since I knew that quite a few people in the fandom really enjoyed it.
But being a published author was something that I'd wanted since I was a kid, so I decided to go through with it. I revised the entirety of T3S, taking care to change any copyrighted material within it. Then, I went off to query.
While I did get one full manuscript request (which, let's be real, is probably more than I deserved) I mostly received rejections. Automated rejections.
I tried rewriting T3S several times, but despite my best efforts, I never really managed to fix the things that were fundamentally wrong with the story and the writing. Turns out, I wasn't good enough writer at 18 to be published (shocker, I know).
Recently, spurred on by a kind DM, I decided to take one last crack at T3S. The story needs some fundamental reworking--which means it's going to take some time to write up a new draft. BUT the good news is this: I'm no longer considering a traditional publishing route. Once the story is finished, it WILL be indie published. And, as a thank-you to everyone who read it back when it was a fic, I'm going to provide a tumblr-exclusive code for y'all to access a digital version of the published work for FREE.
In the meantime, I'll be active on this blog again with updates about how the story's progressing + the revision process + posting teasers of my favorite new lines and scenes. & of course, I'll probably end up watching the seasons of Camp Camp that I've missed. Feel free to ask me any questions; I'd be happy to answer them :)
Thank you to everybody for your patience! I know it sucks when an author takes down a fic, so I hope that with this post, I can begin to make it up to y'all!
theartofmadeline
vaporwave
gummygunk
yousharknotpass
titsay
turnnoffyourmind
